(first posted 5/4/2013. One of my better finds) The early eighties was the most revolutionary and unique time in the American automobile industry ever. Thanks to exploding oil and fuel prices, and with the expectation that the increases would continue indefinitely, for the only time ever Americans embraced radical downsizing with a fervor. It was as if the US was finally joining the rest of the world. Of course, it didn’t last; as soon as oil prices started dropping, everyone quickly forgot the whole episode, and the truck/SUV boom soon exploded. But for a few short years, it was out with the big, in with the small. The little relics from that era are becoming hard to find: K-Car limousines, Chevy Sprints, Diesel Rabbits. (of course, we’ve found all of those). But there are others that I’d forgotten ever existed, like this tiny FWD diesel KubVan.
It’s hard to fully appreciate how small this thing is, without a frame of reference. Let’s just say it would look right at home on the streets of Paris. If it helps to put it in perspective, it’s powered by a VW 54 hp Diesel Rabbit FWD drive train, and it has an aluminum unibody, and a very low flat floor. The interior shot probably best helps put some scale to this thing.
There’s not a lot of information available about the KubVan, except that it was apparently built by van-builder Grumman with the hope winning a large contract with the Post Office. The USPS was mighty anxious about fuel prices too, and was looking for a new generation of delivery vehicles.
It’s not clear whether the KubVan was built in response to an RFP, or on speculation, but by the time it had fully evaluated it, the Post Office decided it was too small, despite its 35 mpg potential. Well, by 1986, everything from the height of the crisis years was suddenly looking too small.
So Grumman went back to the drawing board, and came up with the Grumman LLV (Long Life Vehice), which was bigger, taller, and very conventional, given that it now sat on a Chevy S-10 frame/chassis with the Iron Duke four. Between 1986 and 1995, Grumman built 150k of the LLVs, and the USPS is still rebuilding them to keep them in service, despite the mediocre fuel mileage (15mpg).
Only 500 KubVans were built, and maybe 100 are left. Whether the USPS actually bought and used any or just tested them is unknown (to me). But apparently some were bought by delivery services and the like. And due to their light aluminum bodies and VW diesel power train, they have a bit of a cult following.
Curiously, the KubVan has been reprised, at least in concept form, by Ford’s 2005 Syn-us concept. Well, in 2005, oil prices were rising. Today, there wouldn’t likely be much interest, especially with vehicle like the Ford Transit Connect being available.
I always wanted to get a LLV ,slide a 4.3 v6 in it and jazz up the interior. It would make a great grocery getter.
This is my van, here is the best KUB Van site on the web.http://www.divemaster.ca/kubvans/
Good luck…
What I don’t understand re the LLV is why they didn’t re-engine it with a small Diesel – that seems well-suited to the driving cycle of postal delivery, quite apart from economy.
Canada selected the Transit Connect as successor to the LLV in its postal fleet.
I am fairly certain the wheels on this one are from a 91 or 92 VW Jetta. (Steelies that were covered by hubcaps originally). Nice find!
That seat and steering wheel also seem to be upgraded from work-van equipment.
I wonder if the rig would have been more successful here if it’d just been a foot taller with nothing else changed – it looks like a normal person would really have to bend over to move around inside it.
Between the Ford Transit Connect and the MB Sprinter we really have come full circle back to the conditions that created this. Inflation adjusted we are not all that far off the early 80s peak of fuel prices.
I wonder if the KubVan was just too small to carry a normal load of mail and parcels.
I always thought the USPS Fleet would be a prime candidate to be re-engined with a hybrid system.
Since much of our mail is junk, you’d think the Postal Service would charge enough for junk mail to cover the costs of larger vehicles required for its bulk. At least, it would in a rational world.
Some Excel™ jockey in USPS probably has a trade study on the economics of hybrid vans. At least, that’s what I’d ask for if I ran things. Then they could pressure manufacturers to make that available, if it made sense.
One variable is gonna be, how well the technology is gonna age.
I don’t mean just the actual hardware and its service life; is it going to be competitive fifteen years down the pike? Or will fuel-cell technology or widespread hydrogen availability or a breakthrough battery, make hybrids seem as dated as lockup three-speed automatics?
Look at the Kubvan. Winner, right? Except…VW no longer makes that drivetrain and they’re not interested in mass-production of components. Not when they can command premium prices for perceived premium-quality completed cars.
Had USPS gone Kubvan instead of LLV…what drivetrain would they have had to patch in there at rebuild time? Because it wouldn’t be just the engine; the transaxle wouldn’t have taken 30 years of stop-and-go fully loaded, either.
So…point is…whatever they buy to replace the LLV…is going to have to be either cheap; or conservative and proven…or (the reality is) politically connected.
(Which wouldn’t be the first time. Kaiser-Jeep got the original Postal contract, because of Henry Kaiser’s contacts with the government – and his company’s experience building war-materiel jeeps and trucks.)
“So…point is…whatever they buy to replace the LLV…is going to have to be either cheap; or conservative and proven…or (the reality is) politically connected.”
Exactly. Expect the involvement of Michigan’s Congressional delegation, for starters.
Had they purchased the Kub en masse they would do just like the do with the LLV and rebuild the engine and transmission, every 3 or 4 years.
The postal service has been testing many alternatives for a number of years, off the shelf minivans, Escape Hybrids, EV conversions of LLVs to repowering LLVs with diesel and newer gas and FFV engines.
The reality is though that the avg postal vehicle doesn’t travel very many miles in a day, 18 in the stuff I’ve seen, so pay back on more fuel efficient options can be pretty long.
Well the design must have found favor up in the great white north as Canada post ran them for a number of years and I have seen a few ex postie vans running around here. One fellow used his to deliver milk from his dairy. The last one I saw for sale was in the $7-8$k price range and touted the efficiency of its diesel vw drive train. Neat find I immagine the popularity up here was due to expensive gas prices and the former cheaper price of diesel which is now the price of premium fuel (about $1.35 a litre give or take)….
Canada Post ran them?
I figured the build number of 500 was a little low. Not when there were two in my own neighborhood…what are the odds of THAT!
Around about 1990 the wanderlust took me…out of work and traveling to Alaska and the Pacific Northwest in search of the Holy Grail…or good-paying work. I seem to remember seeing a few of those, elsewhere.
Before even that trip, however, in Elyria, Ohio…I had dealings with a Postal Vehicle enthusiast – I needed DJ-5C information and he had it. And he had a Kubvan…he was a rural mail carrier and he’d converted his to right-hand drive with a chain-connect steering wheel, right side to left-side column. But he told he his dealings with two Maintenance Facilities, was that they were scared off by the FWD drivetrain. The S-10 running gear, strictly conventional, gave comfort to bureaucrat-mechanics.
Grumman? Shouldn’t they have been off building F4Fs or something?
I too wondered why I was seeing so many Grumman ID’s on commercial vehicles. I eventually concluded that it must have been a profitable side business utilizing their aluminum fabrication skill set.
Diversification; no more fighter prime-contracting after the F-22 & F-35 (& things aren’t looking good for them lately, even w/o budget cuts), while dedicated attack types like the A-6 are being replaced by multirole F-18s & hopefully F-35s. Good thing old Leroy (company founder & designer of its 1st fighter, the FF) didn’t have to see all this. They knew their stuff; most Grumman aircraft designs were successful. The F4F, despite being obsolete late in the War for first-line air combat, remained in production by GM because it was still valuable for antisubmarine warfare. The Brits loved it.
Actually Grumman started diversifying after WW2, making the famous Ag Cat crop-duster, boats, etc.
And let’s not forget about the Lunar Lander than Grumman designed and built for NASA.
Yes, thank you. I think the LEM was the 1st manned spacecraft designed solely for use in space: no aerodynamics at all. VW had a brilliant ad at the time with merely a picture of a model LEM, declaring, “It’s ugly, but it gets you there.”
Interesting vehicle. It might have been that it was too small for post office duties or that politics came into play. After all the heart of the vehicle was a VW power plant. Due to the time period this was made was also the same time period that the backlash over imported Asian cars had hit its peak and “Buy America” was the procurement law of the land.
Or it could be that importing the VW engine n to the USA was expensive for Grumman. The products in the then function Westmoreland VW plant were atrocious and made the Renult Alliance seem like a quality product.
Or could have been practicality, the Iron Duke was made by the millions in the years it was made. Parts were cheap and they were to an extent low maintenance(no timing belt replacement) and somewhat reliable(the big issues were cracked headbolts and the original cam shaft sprocket chipped a few teeth and it knocked the timing off(It was non interference engine so you put a new sprocket on and timed and you were off(unlike the VW with it’s valve smashing abilities when the belt broke) )
It could have been that GM ruined diesel engines for everybody in the USA in those years and the powers that be in the procurement business were afraid about unreliable engines(the Duke was uninspiring, slow, and noisy BUT you could beat it like a drum and it would go still) even though therte were and still are many many many Benz W123 diesels out there with millions of miles and heavy trucks used diesel with no issues.
As for gas mileage, 15-20 mpg was far better then the old jeeps of the time but nowadays a bit sad. I heard they were retrofitting them with CNG but I don’t know if that happened. I don’t know why they have not replaced them yet since the last estimate on repairing verses buying new shows they actually save money buying a new fleet
Re: diversification – just about every Boy Scout camp in the country has a flotilla of Grumman aluminum canoes, mostly all decades old. Just about indestructible.
Grumman also played with aluminum buses when they owned Flxible in the late ’70s until ’83. I gather the aluminum frame didn’t do well with big-city potholes, though. (See Henry Petrowski’s book To Engineer is Human.) FWIW, the rural mail carriers around here like RHD Subaru Outbacks. They look like JDM rather than conversions. Not sure, but I suspect they are contract carriers and are privately owned.
If they are driving Subarus then yes they are contract carriers. They are not JDM they are US postal spec with all the US equipment but RHD. If you show you are a postal carrier you can order one from your local dealer.
Flxible was an odd case – the company was in play for years before Grumman bought it; the 870 bus was designed during its ownership by Rohr; and it was about ready for rollout when Grumman came to own it.
Of course, Grumman put their own name on the product…bad, bad move! It wasn’t ready for prime time.
There is some question about whether the buses that had frame-head cracking were abused on pothole-lined streets. Other agencies used them and were just fine; and the bus survived Grumman ownership and was Flxible’s only product up until the company closed down.
I drove a few, when I worked for Denver RTD. I liked them.
“Whether the USPS actually bought and used any or just tested them is unknown (to me).”
The Postal Service in Cleveland (main vehicle facility) had ONE…done up in Raymond-Lowey Eagle livery. I don’t know how much it was used; but at the time (1982) I was trying to score a used Postal Jeep. I saw it there and thought, damn! that would make a nice mail truck!
There was one other around Cleveland’s West Side, at the same time…not, as far as I know, USPS. Plain and white. I thought it was the Next Thing in Step-Vans…turned out, not so.
Very interesting find. I don’t know if I have ever seen one of these. I do remember one that was built by AM general with a front wheel drive K car (2.2 or a variant). It looked like an anteater but knew a serviceman who had one. He swore by it
It may have been too ugly to be successful. For whatever reasons it did not seem to catch on but I still see some running around. 1 ton, low flat floor, big back door. Whats not to like. I see the same attributes in this rig.
I see history repeating itself. Saw that the Transit Connect is barely outselling the Flex. Maybe Ford needs a Postal contract now.
Ford had one. The Ford FFV.
Data on the Web is sketchy on this one; but it’s based on the Ford Ranger.
Obviously, since Postal buyers are searching for a new long-life vehicle, they’re underwhelmed by this one.
Kinda like an extension of the GM chassised LLV, but these for some reason, have not been adopted like the LLV, I still see tons of LLV’s and hardly any of these in service. Its is Ranger based, like the LLV was S-10 based. Its seems hard to believe that the LLV was once brand new, having them on the road for the last 20 plus years has made them part of the landscape.
It was actually based on a modified export Explorer frame, the original version right about the time it was being discontinued. So it would have been very expensive for Ford to keep producing it, hence the small numbers produced.
http://media.ford.com/article_display.cfm?article_id=2230
The other things it had going against it was that the postal service wanted FFVs (hence the name) so they put the only FFV engine used in the Explorer the SOHC 4.0, a not very durable engine. The only AT in the bin that bolted to it was the 5R55 5sp. So it had a very poor choice of power trains all around since the average postal vehicle does not need 160HP and rarely gets out of second gear. Still there are a number of them on the road.
Had they chosen to make it on the Ranger and used the Vulcan 3.0 FFV engine and simpler, cheaper 4sp AT they could have produced them longer and they would have had a more durable, more economical drive train.
Changing the subject a bit, sorry.
I used to change oil in our local LLVs and always wanted to buy one just to play with. My idea was to take it to a car show one year with a tribute to Charlton Heston in the back with a head to toe picture framed up and a couple of toy guns on both sides (Going Postal, get it?). The next year go back to same show and have the top chopped a few inches but also have the picture and the guns chopped in the back of it too. Kept on picturing Moses with just a head on top of a pair of dress shoes surrounded by a fancy picture frame and a couple of shortened AK47s. Never seen any LLVs for sale and figured there might be too many rocket launchers owned by NRA members to actually try it.
The Postal Service has never sold one.
The bodies are aluminum; wrecked ones that cannot be salvaged in-house, are surely sold for scrap.
It would be pretty cool to see at a car show if someone could get one.
Interesting article and comments. I recall a small van at the local Dodge dealer, 15-20 years ago? I distinctly remember it was assembled by Harley-Davidson, never caught on, disappeared and never seen since; never thought of it since then, until this article. Anyone have any information?
Twenty years ago, Harley-Davidson was just rebounding from the shocks of being starved by AMF and then taken private by Willie Davidson and associates – and lacking deep resources.
I don’t know definitively that there wasn’t such a one-off; but H-D was so desperate they sold their golf cart line when they were bought out.
Ford used to have a marketing deal with H-D for pickups; I suppose it could have carried over to an Econoline Harley package.
The van was not an Econoline. This was a new vehicle at a Dodge dealership. It was about the size and shape of a postal truck, manufactured by Harley, but badged as something else I think. I can’t remember what the drivetrain was. I stopped one night after closing to look it over, they had several.
You’re thinking of the Aeromate. Had a Dodge Caravan engine and transmission and front wheel drive. Much larger than the Kubvan, but same basic concept.
Don’t see too many of these around anymore, they always struck me as strange looking with that extended hood
Front wheel drive in a new LLV should be a must. Traction in the rear wheel drive ones that they have is terrible, compounded by the fact that the front track is narrower than the back track so each axle has to cut its own path in fresh snow.
Yes, my carrier frequently struggles in the snow. It must be a real chore to deal with that all winter long.
As a 35 year mail carrier I can tell you we were very happy to get the LLVs. The old Jeeps were so badly rusted that driving through an inch of standing water resulted in wet feet inside the truck. When we were told that the LLVs were expected to last 20 years we laughed uproariously. The first LLVs arrived in 1987. Hard to believe S10 based vehicles are still in use 6 hours a day, 6-7 days a week at 30 years of age.
I recall seeing small Grumman step vans for sale at Price Club (which later became Costco) many, many years ago. The local store had one parked out front with a sign on it. You could buy them, and order as many as you wanted. Back then, Price Club did a good business buying close-out merchandise and selling it through their stores. Don’t know if it was this model or something else, but the time frame was about right.